Texas State Troopers watch over a rally in support of open carry gun laws at the Capitol, Monday, Jan. 26, 2015, in Austin, Texas.

(AP Photo/Eric Gay)

Gun violence and Second Amendment rights have been banner issues as the U.S. grapples with our title as the only developed nation with a such a large (and ever increasing) number of mass shootings. Although the federal government is at a standstill on how to move forward, Texas took it upon itself to pass new open carry and campus carry laws in June.

There was vocal, but ultimately ineffective, opposition to the laws as Democrats tried to stop the passage of Senate Bill 17, which allows for holstered open carry of handguns, and Senate Bill 11 the bill that OKs concealed handguns on the campuses of public universities. Arguments about the possible confusion and dangers of open carry were refuted with comparisons to other states including Oklahoma, which has had open carry since November 2012. Proponents contended that because the neighboring state hasn’t dissolved into mayhem since the law came into effect, Texas won’t either.

Public universities are still trying to figure out how best to implement campus carry, which will be on campuses on August 1, 2016—the day of the fiftieth anniversary of Charles Whitman’s shooting rampage from the University of Texas at Austin’s clock tower. Open carry, however, is now just two weeks away.

Texas law enforcement has also been pretty vocal about their concerns with open carry. They are, after all, the group who’ll have to deal with most of the potential fallout of the new law in the upcoming months. While a majority of police chiefs have expressed a general opposition to the law (75 percent, according to a survey in February) , they were most vocal in May when a provision was added that would prevent police officers from stopping people solely because they were openly carrying a gun. By then, the passing of open carry seemed inevitable, so even Democrats who were originally opposed to the law supported the provision in hopes that it would help prevent the targeting of color openly carrying handguns.

“What’s going to happen is more interaction between police and black and brown and poor people because of lawful activity,” Rep. Harold Dutton told KXAN.

The provision made some sense, especially considering issues of racial profiling among Texas state troopers, but it was flawed. In May, Austin Police Chief Art Acevedo said at a news conference that the provision would “handcuff” police officers and prevent them from doing their jobs. He was accompanied by members of the Texas Police Chiefs Association, the Combined Law Enforcement Association of Texas, the Sheriff’s Association of Texas, and police unions from Houston and Dallas.

“If it doesn’t get removed, the only responsible thing to do is for the governor to veto,” Acevedo said.

Police opposition did manage to stall a bill that looked like it was straight on its way to Governor Abbott, who’d earlier promised to sign any bill that expanded gun rights. After the conference, House members opted to negotiate on the bill, eventually passing a version without the provision. That version then made its way to Abbott’s desk, and it was signed into law (at a shooting range, of course) in June.

Even with the provision removed, law enforcement still anticipate problems in the months after open carry goes into effect. As the Houston Chronicle’s Lauren McGaughy explained, they aren’t convinced by comparisons with Oklahoma.

Experts predict that open carry will most likely take place in small numbers in rural areas, but unlike Oklahoma, six of the most populous cities in the country are in Texas: Houston, San Antonio, Dallas, Austin, Fort Worth, and El Paso. And that’s not taking into account the political climate around gun control in Texas this year. There have been number of demonstrators openly carrying rifles in large cities, the most recent being a group of armed protestors in front of a mosque in Irving and demonstrators who marched with rifles near UT-Austin and later held a mock mass shooting to protest “gun-free zones.” It’s still unclear why they felt the need to protest what would soon be law.

But one of the biggest concerns of law enforcement is establishing the fine line between respecting the rights of someone legally carrying a handgun and protecting the general public. “What happens when an officer sees someone openly carrying a handgun in a holster, in accordance with the law, what can an officer legally do?” Shannon Edmonds, director of governmental relations for the Texas District and County Attorneys Association, told the Houston Chronicle. “We keep getting more questions than answers.”

The fear is that open carry will make it harder for police officers to tell the difference between a law-abiding citizen legally carrying a gun and someone with criminal intentions carrying a gun. In the Houston Chronicle, comments like these from Ray Hunt, president of the Houston Police Officers Union, don’t really help to clarify things.

Houston police, he said, will not “be doing random stops of people simply to see if they have a CHL,” but they also will not “sit back for 30 minutes” if they have a reasonable suspicion to stop someone.

So, what will they do?

Fears over this ambiguity were heightened after a Halloween shooting in Colorado, a state that allows open carry of rifles and handguns. That Saturday, Naomi Bettis called 911 to report that her neighbor, Noah Harpham, was walking around in public with a rifle. The dispatcher on that first call assured Bettis that open carry was legal in Colorado and Harpham was within his rights. Moments later, Bettis called 911 again after Harpham began shooting people. Harpham killed three people before he was shot and killed in a shootout with police.

On November 4, during one of the first informational meetings held in Houston to help citizens understand the upcoming effects of open carry, Houston Police Chief Charles A. McClelland, Jr., Harris County District Attorney Devon Anderson, and city attorney Donna Edmundson had difficulties providing any clarity.

According to The Trace, this was the very first question:“If a person is carrying his weapon openly, how does a police officer determine if he is legal at that point?” After hearing that police can indeed ask to see someone’s license to carry, the follow-up question was, “If I think someone is just walking around with a gun [without a license], should I just do a 911?”

That’s one of the major changes law enforcement expects in the months following open carry: An increase in concerned calls about people with guns. How do they respond appropriately to these calls and avoid something like Colorado’s Halloween shooting without infringing on anybody’s rights?

Chief McClelland advised the questioner to make observations about people openly carrying to gauge their threat level, using an example of someone walking into a bank in warm weather while wearing an “all-weather coat.” But he also promised that anytime someone felt alarmed and called police, “[they’re] gonna come.”

There’s also the issue of understanding which buildings the new law applies to. Even the panelists at the informational meeting admitted they were still working on figuring that out.

“As a police officer, it is so complex,” Chief Charles A. McClelland, Jr., announced. “I don’t really understand all the nuances of the law.” City Attorney Donna Edmundson agreed. “Unfortunately,” she said, “this law wasn’t written very well. It’s not very clear.” District Attorney Devon Anderson conceded, “This is complicated.” Later, she admitted to only learning that morning to which government buildings the law applied.

Earlier in December, commissioners in Smith County wrestled with the issue of whether they would run afoul of the new law by keeping their courthouses gun-free. According to KLTV, Smith County Sheriff Larry Smith argued to “prohibit open or concealed carry into the courthouse and other facilities that have a court. For the safety of the public with all the inmates that we carry through the tunnel to the courthouse every day.”

Smith County Commissioner Terry Phillips was hesitant, interpreting a memo from Abbott to mean that the “no weapons” sign (Penal Code 30.06) could only be placed on “individual courts and court offices” instead of at the entrance of the courthouse. Phillips worried that posting improper signs would lead to lawsuits under the new law. Eventually, on December 8, commissioners voted to keep Smith County courthouses gun-free even after open carry.

For all the questions and concerns that state law enforcement can anticipate, they’ve been conducting training programs and creating educational videos to train officers on how to handle open carry situations. In Rusk County, training began as early as September. In October, Emily Taylor, a lawyer with Texas Law Shield, told The Washington Times that she’d already conducted more than 40 training programs with law enforcement. There are even more training programs scheduled throughout the state all the way through May of next year. For the Austin Police Department, the preparation not only involves cadets and veteran police officers, but also dispatchers.

But we’ll have to wait until after December 31 to see how effective any of this has been.

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Comments

The Fourth Amendment prohibits police from seizing people unless there is reasonable suspicion of crime afoot. Seizing people just to demand to see a license to say, drive a car, or carry a gun, is also a violation of the Fourth Amendment, actionable under 42 USC 1983 for damages, injunctive relief, and attorney fee shifting if the offended citizen substantially prevails. It would have been better to codify this fact into the bill, so that police would not make the mistake of seizing open carriers just to check licenses – now Texas police departments are going to have to discipline police officers who seize open carriers just because they want to see a license, aand go thru unecessary lawsuits during this upcoming learning cuyve. Learn more about the open carry of properly holstered handguns. And carry on!

Bmac

So in effect, Open Carry allows rights for both the lawful gun owner and the criminal gun owner. Gun rights activists often cite that criminals won’t give up their guns so why should they! Ok, fair point, but now police can’t tell whether a person is a gangster who illegally purchased or doesn’t have a license to carry or is a “responsible gun owner.” If a police officer has the right to apply “suspicion of a crime” then so can civilians. Civilians should be able to call the police when they see someone carrying a gun that they suspect is going to commit a crime and the Police SHOULD investigate.

BillMiller66

First of all, the police don’t have “rights.” A police officer or other government official acting in his official capacity has powers, and only those powers which We The People delegate to him.

Who really thinks that gang-bangers and convicted felons are going to start openly carrying their firearms?

willid3

why not? seems like once the populace gets used to open carry and no longer sees that a being threatening, they will have no reason to not too

SirVesa

Willfully ignorant is no way to go through life. That is the stupidest thing you have said yet…and that’s saying a lot.

willid3

not really. people get used to what they feel as ‘normal’. we have gotten used to not having guns being present every where. in past that was ‘normal’ today that wouldnt be so. except that its more prevalent in rural areas where guns are the norm. in the cities its the exception and usually means that crime is rampant

Everett Walker

Open carry is legal in most states as it should be- though not particularly popular. There are a number of reasons why most people regard at least minimal concealment as the better alternative. At the very least, it avoids unnecessary conversation with nuts on both sides of the issue, attempted gun-grabs by the criminally inclined and SWAT calls from crazed democrats who can avoid any legal repercussions attached to making false reports by pleading a lower standard of responsibility due to personal limitations
The real danger of gun-grabs prompts most advocates of open carry to recommend retention holsters and many of them actually complicate deploying the handgun more than a single layer of covering garment.

kofybean

“calls from crazed democrats who can avoid any legal repercussions attached to making false reports” The guy who falsly reported that John Crawford III threaten people in Walmart was a democrat?

BillMiller66

So you think that when Harry the Hoodlum goes out for stroll, he’s going to open carry? And when the police drive by and one officer says to the other, “Hey, isn’t that Harry the Hoodlum with a firearms?”

Felon in possession of a firearm will get you five years in club fed.

Do you still think that criminals will open carry?

Sharon Brucks

Doesn’t Harry have to be doing something suspicious? So maybe there should be a physical description for profiling. All those women who have been in prison are older ladies now!

BillMiller66

The answer is “no.” A police officer who recognizes a convicted felon in possession of a firearm has probable cause to arrest him. A convicted felon is legally disabled from possessing a firearm. See 18 U.S.C. § 922.

Larry

No. Open carry requires a concealed permit, aka license. The police can exercise their authority to check your license and weapon.

Sharon Brucks

Why can’t they? They can’t be asked if they have licenses if they are just standing around showing their guns to each other. Isn’t that what part of this about? People who want attention or some kind of respect for having a fancy gun and/or holster to show off? And I dont mean that disrespectfully…It’s like who has the best car or shoes, etc

BillMiller66

Can you think of any reason why someone who is legally disabled from possessing a firearm would not want to openly carry a firearm? What if a police officer recognizes him and arrests him? Ten years imprisonment and/or a $250,000 fine. Federal law (18 U.S.C. § 922[g][1-9]) prohibits certain individuals from possessing firearms,ammunition, or explosives.

Ptolemy Pahlavi

Texas was one of the VERY few states that didn’t allow open carry. It’s not going to be any different than 90% of the other states that allow it. In case you don’t remember, there was never a law outlawing open carry of rifles and shotguns, so openly carrying an AR-15 has always been legal. Yet we don’t see armies of people slinging them around in public. This is more for people that live in rural areas than in big cities where its going to be very impolite to do so.

Everett Walker

You are right. Open carry is strong legal protection for inadvertent exposure of the holstered gun but blatant exhibition in crowded venues is impolite. Good manners are important even when they benefit liberal democrats as well as regular people.

Of the 44 other states permitting open carry, where has that been a problem. It is a problem only in the fevered mind of a libera.

willid3

it does doesnt it? its just not always followed. but then the first amendment guarantees free speech. but its not absolute is it? and the 14th applies the federal constitution to state and local government. course constitution also had a provision about slavery too. and then there is the 5th amendment, which up until about 50-60 years tended to be ignored by the police all the time. look how long it took before the police started to actually follow that amendment. about 100 years.

don76550

No, it is not a violation of your rights for an officer to ask to see your gun permit if you are open carrying no more than him asking to see your drivers license if you are driving. Do what he says. If he becomes abusive resolve it in court, go after his badge and money.

BillMiller66

So an officer can pull over drivers at random just to demand ID? Do you really think that that is the law?

don76550

No, but troopers can have checkpoints and do in many states. State legislatures decide that.

Sharon Brucks

Yeah, I think they pretty much can. If a cop signals you to pull over, you better do it. Maybe you didn’t use your turn signal or you turned too wide and he was “concerned.”

BillMiller66

Sharon, my question is whether the very act of driving absent any other exigent circumstances gives an officer “reasonable suspicion” to stop a motorist. A motorist is driving down the street obeying all traffic laws. he isn’t swerving and there is nothing to suggest that he is violating any law; he is simply engaging in an activity for which a license is required.

An officer pulls over the motorist and *demands* to see his ID. Is that a lawful command?

A safty checkpoint checking every driver is different than the police picking on one driver without reaonable suspicion

China Cat

I honestly just don’t get it. I’m a gun owner, in our house. I don’t want to live in a war zone and don’t want to have to deal with your agenda with a loaded gun strapped to you to back it up. And I do believe that anybody that has to strap open carry is basically somebody that wants to engender fear, not defeat it. Just because you can doesn’t mean you have to.

cgray

The whole Tamir Rice garbage again. What part of “sticking a gun in peoples’ faces is illegal” do you not understand? Tamir wasn’t open carrying, he was committing felonies by terrorizing people, and he was justifiably put down. The end. Act like a grown-up for once in your life and deal with it.

Indiana Pearl

Any business that permits open carry will lose my patronage. Open carry is nuts!

CJ Grisham

Any business that bans it will lose mine. Gun control is nuts.

mark wyatt

Are background checks that keep criminals from buying Ak’s at gun shows “nuts” ? I don’t care if you have a Bradley tank w/ flamethrower in your garage CJ , and a turret built into your roof with an M-60 and grenade luancher , if that makes you feel safer . Maybe you would like to hunt w/ a sniper rifle , or a gatlin gun , doesn’t matter to 77+% of americans. Because you can probably pass the background check . We just don’t want criminals and mentally sick people supplying the planet with guns sold in the US at gun-shows . Its ridiculous to supply the drug cartels over this registration issue . Keep your guns . Build an arsenal , if your legal, and don’t drink and drive drunk if you’ve already killed people in DWI’s , its the same thing .

MollyB

ah yes…the mythical “gunshow loophole”. Doesn’t exist. Your argument is invalid. All of the people legally open carrying have already had a background check, so you should feel all snuggly in your feelings.

gordon smith

What? I can go to gun show and buy from private party with out background check. I can buy from my neighbor without background check.

Nothing “mythical” about that…

MollyB

Wow…the dumb is strong with this one. You just illustrated why it is a myth…it has NOTHING to do with gun-shows. SMDH

Bmac

No, the dumb is with you because you failed to prove why it’s a myth, other than in your own imagination. I can go to any gun show here, and without a license I can buy any gun I want. There is no legal president for me to have to have gotten a license before I can buy a gun at a show.

Also…if it’s a myth, then why won’t legislators and the NRA allow that loophole to be closed?

MollyB

Seriously? You didn’t get the part about it not having anything to do with a gun show? If you’re talking about buying firearms in the actual gun show, call the ATF because that is a violation of Federal law. If you’re talking about buying a gun from some dude in the parking lot, then you don’t understand what a gun show is. Private US citizens are not prohibited from selling or trading firearms between them, but a firearms dealer must perform a background check per federal law. The reason it hasn’t been closed, nor should it be closed, is because it would make it illegal, for instance, for a father to give his son a hunting rifle or for someone to inherit one from a deceased relative. There’s that annoying little 2nd Amendment that keeps getting in the way.

And what are you trying to accomplish? All of the mass shootings on record used legally-obtained weapons.

willid3

that only applies in California where what you say is true. but not in Texas

MollyB

Explain.

willid3

well you read the law in California. if you buy from a private seller or at a gun show and not from a licensed gun dealer you have to go to a licensed gun dealer to take possession of the weapon. thats the law in California

SirVesa

You ignorant twit. That is exactly the opposite of what she said. So no, it doesn’t “only apply in California”. Your reading comprehension needs work.

willid3

as does yours

BillMiller66

Have you read the 2004 study by the National Academy of Science on the efficacy of gun control laws? The Brady bill requiring background checks had no effect on crime.

Gary Denton

BillMiller 66 is either a LIAR or has been misinformed.
The 2004 NAS study found that “because of the limitations of existing data and methods, do not credibly demonstrate a causal relationship between the ownership of firearms and the causes or prevention of criminal violence or suicide… The committee recommends support of further individual-level studies of the link between firearms and both lethal and nonlethal suicidal behavior.”
The NRA got their politicians to ban the government supported studies that the NAS recommended in this misnamed study.
There is also frequent mentions by gun supporters of a 2007 “Harvard study” that doesn’t exist, it was an opinion piece by Harvard Libertarians.
The only major statistician that supports no gun controls and has claimed all the laws don’t work is John Lott, who has been frequently called “the world’s worst statistician” and has been often paid by conservative groups to lend support for their causes. such as the disputed presidential vote counting in Florida. Lott was singled out in the House Committee report with a long separate appendix highlighting his errors

SirVesa

So you believe owning guns makes you want to commit suicide? Or maybe your reading comprehension deficit caused you to miss the “causes or prevention” clause. I should expect nothing less from a bunch of twits that have a hard time comprehending the Constitution. And explain how violent crime in Texas has decreased dramatically since the passing of the concealed carry laws in the mid-90s even though population has more than doubled? BillMiller66 is correct…the current gun control laws (or the proposed “new” laws) do nothing to curb crime.

Gary Denton

Violent crime has decreased dramatically nationwide. Texas gun laws had nothing to do with it. Which is why you need studies which the NRA opposes.
I expect nothing less from twits who try to twist meanings or ignore clauses like “well-regulated”.

MollyB

oh goody…another clown that believes in coincidence. And he also believes that the Founders were just willy-nilly with punctuation in the 2nd Amendment….nowhere else, just the 2nd.

Well, my friend, punctuation matters. The Amendment is broken into phrases: “A well regulated Militia, being necessary to the security of a free State, the right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed.” If I said “A well balanced breakfast, being necessary to a nutritional diet, the right of the people to keep and eat food shall not be infringed” Who has the Right to keep and eat food? The breakfast? Or the People?

Hopefully you realize that your definition of well-regulated stems from the Big Government nanny state we’ve become. Well-regulated as used in the Constitution and personal letters from the Founders simply means trained. They did not specify how that training should be done or that there was any requirement to do so, simply that it was important to liberty. You petulant, foot-stomping little children should really come up with a new attack plan.

Gary Denton

Another clown MollyBB is one of the recent converts to the belief that well regulated must have meant something different when the Bill of Rights was written. That is difficult to reconcile with 200 years of government gun regulations supported by the courts.

The people have a right to keep and bear arms, which is subject to government regulation, as Justice Scalia writes in his NRA approved opinion.

Petulant foot-stomping conservatives should quit dancing around and admit they don’t know the first thing about law, or reading comprehension.

Sharon Brucks

Gosh, so ANGRY, and packing a gun. Calm down!

MollyB

Angry? Sorry…I forgot facts scare some of you. I’ll make sure and post a trigger warning next time.

In 2004 the National Academy of Sciences issued a 328-page report based on 253 journal articles, 99 books, 43 government publications, a survey of 80 different gun-control laws and some of its own independent study. In short, the panel could find no link between restrictions on gun ownership and lower rates of crime, firearms violence or even accidents with guns. http://www8.nationalacademies.org/onpinews/newsitem.aspx?RecordID=10881

As for John Lott’s research, here is his site. http://crimeresearch.org/ Read his works and compare it with the critiques by his opponents.

Gary Denton

I quoted from the report. The 2004 NAS study found that “because of the limitations of existing data and methods, do not credibly demonstrate a causal relationship between the ownership of firearms and the causes or prevention of criminal violence or suicide… The committee recommends support of further individual-level studies of the link between firearms and both lethal and nonlethal suicidal behavior.” That means at that time there was no proof owning guns deterred crime nor any proof of increased violence and death.
Other studies since then, not very comprehensive because the NRA is afraid of peer reviewed studies, have found links .

Like most conservatives there is a lack of reading comprehension skills or is hoping to persuade others

MollyB

So the study was absolute crap. They couldn’t prove one way or the other that guns prevented crime or increased crime. And you talk about reading comprehension. What a hoot.

I love how you folks try to portray those of us with a different worldview as evil or stupid. Your condescension is appreciated though…it makes it easy for us to identify you. So maybe…since its the “law of the land” like you folks like to keep saying about things like Obamacare…get off your ample rump and fight to get the law changed instead of b!tching on the Internet.

wessexmom

Well, if you’re open carrying at your local Kroger and you accidentally shoot and kill someone in the frozen food section then you should get the same prison time as if you had killed someone in an armed robbery, right? Dead is dead, after all.

SirVesa

Actually, it would be manslaughter, but I thought you ignorant gun-grabbers wanted to blame the gun for these things, right? So it would be the gun’s fault, not mine. Just like we blame the cars for drunk drivers. Oh…wait…no we don’t.

There is absolutely NO way to accidentally shoot someone with a holstered weapon. That is why ignorant bans like this increase the likelihood of an accidental discharge: guns only go off if you are handling them and having to disarm or change your carry type back and forth means you have to handle the weapon. All for a few folks like you that know nothing about guns and lose your f-ing mind at the sight of one.

BillMiller66

Gary, are you retarded? Ask your minder to read and explain my words to you again, especially the part where I write that the.”2004 study by the National Academy of Science” showed that “the Brady bill requiring background checks had no effect on crime.”

Gary Denton

The are you retarded BillMiller666? demonstrates his lack of reading comprehension yet again.The NSA showed that the previous studies were inconclusive. Not that they showed regulation “had no effect”. You could equally well write that the NSA showed the infamous bad statistician John Lott was wrong in his studies of the supposed benefits of guns.

BillMiller66

Apparently you don’t know how science works. When a scientist sets out to test the hypothesis that substance X causes condition Y, and then comes back saying, “We found no evidence that substance X causes condition Y,” that means that X doesn’t cause Y. Is it the final word on the subject? In science, theories are always subject to revision in the face of new evidence. Sir Isaac Newton’s laws of motion were revolutionary, but even he knew that it wasn’t the final word on the subject because his measurements for Mercury kept coming up slightly off. But what if the scientist says “we need more funding to study this some more”? Translation: give us more grant money.

Did you read James Q. Wilson’s dissent?http://www.nap.edu/read/10881/chapter/13
Wilson noted that the committee’s own findings in several tests showed “that shall-issue laws drive down the murder rate.”

Even critics of John Lott such as Ian Ayres and John J. Donohue III pointed out: “We
conclude that Lott and Mustard have made an important scholarly
contribution in establishing that these laws have not led to the massive
bloodbath of death and injury that some of their opponents feared.

Now go back and read the silly predictions by all the liberal Chicken Littles that passage of shall-issue CHL laws would cause the sky to fall. It didn’t happen. Why? Because the data show unequivocally that licensee are far more law-abiding than average people.

The NAS issued its report in 2004. Here it is almost 2016. So the question remains: does allowing law-abiding citizens to carry tools for self-defense lead to a surge in crime and “blood in the streets” as was predicted by Molly Ivins and all the other silly liberal heroes? Of course it doesn’t.

Gary Denton

I miss Molly Ivins, she would laugh as Texas conservatives attempt to persuade as they struggle with their understanding of science.
She would have a hoot at you and the governor as he approved of evicted a display of the Founding Fathers and the Statue of Liberty adoring the Constitution and Bill of Rights as “mocking religion” and used a fake George Washington prayer to say atheists promoted “ignorance and falsehood.”
The NAS meta study did not prove gun ownership and gun laws did anything, it said all the studies hadn’t proven that.
My iPhone is struggling with long replies so this is part one.

Gary Denton

The hypothesis was not do gun laws decrease crime or increase crime or cause more deaths, it was do previous studies tell us anything. The answer was no. That is far different than than your statement that the NAS study showed “The Brady bill requiring background checks had no effect on crime,” which started this thread and has lead to all the comments about reading comprehension.
James Q Wilson had a dissent, meaning he could not get others to agree with him.
Molly Ivins of course did not say that, at all. Here is what she said:

“Taking A Stab At Our Infatuation With Guns

Guns. Everywhere guns.

Let me start this discussion by pointing out that I am not anti-gun. I’m pro-knife. Consider the merits of the knife.

In the first place, you have catch up with someone in order to stab him. A general substitution of knives for guns would promote physical fitness. We’d turn into a whole nation of great runners. Plus, knives don’t ricochet. And people are seldom killed while cleaning their knives.

As a civil libertarian, I of course support the Second Amendment. And I believe it means exactly what it says: “A well-regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.” Fourteen-year-old boys are not part of a well-regulated militia. Members of wacky religious cults are not part of a well-regulated militia. Permitting unregulated citizens to have guns is destroying the security of this free state.

I am intrigued by the arguments of those who claim to follow the judicial doctrine of original intent. How do they know it was the dearest wish of Thomas Jefferson’s heart that teen-age drug dealers should cruise the cities of this nation perforating their fellow citizens with assault rifles? Channelling?

There is more hooey spread about the Second Amendment. It says quite clearly that guns are for those who form part of a well-regulated militia, i.e., the armed forces including the National Guard. The reasons for keeping them away from everyone else get clearer by the day.

The comparison most often used is that of the automobile, another lethal object that is regularly used to wreak great carnage. Obviously, this society is full of people who haven’t got enough common sense to use an automobile properly. But we haven’t outlawed cars yet.

We do, however, license them and their owners, restrict their use to presumably sane and sober adults and keep track of who sells them to whom. At a minimum, we should do the same with guns.

In truth, there is no rational argument for guns in this society. This is no longer a frontier nation in which people hunt their own food. It is a crowded, overwhelmingly urban country in which letting people have access to guns is a continuing disaster. Those who want guns – whether for target shooting, hunting or potting rattlesnakes (get a hoe) – should be subject to the same restrictions placed on gun owners in England – a nation in which liberty has survived nicely without an armed populace.

The argument that “guns don’t kill people” is patent nonsense. Anyone who has ever worked in a cop shop knows how many family arguments end in murder because there was a gun in the house. Did the gun kill someone? No. But if there had been no gun, no one would have died. At least not without a good footrace first. Guns do kill. Unlike cars, that is all they do.

Michael Crichton makes an interesting argument about technology in his thriller “Jurassic Park.” He points out that power without discipline is making this society into a wreckage. By the time someone who studies the martial arts becomes a master – literally able to kill with bare hands – that person has also undergone years of training and discipline. But any fool can pick up a gun and kill with it.

“A well-regulated militia” surely implies both long training and long discipline. That is the least, the very least, that should be required of those who are permitted to have guns, because a gun is literally the power to kill. For years, I used to enjoy taunting my gun-nut friends about their psycho-sexual hang-ups – always in a spirit of good cheer, you understand. But letting the noisy minority in the National Rifle Association force us to allow this carnage to continue is just plain insane.

I do think gun nuts have a power hang-up. I don’t know what is missing in their psyches that they need to feel they have to have the power to kill. But no sane society would allow this to continue.

Ban the damn things. Ban them all.

You want protection? Get a dog.”

BillMiller66

Ivins was so amazing silly and misinformed on the issue it’s hard to know where to start.

“It says quite clearly that guns are for those who form part of a
well-regulated militia, i.e., the armed forces including the National
Guard.”

The Second Amendment was enacted in 1791. The National Guard wasn’t even created until 1903. Anyone who believes that should read “The Bill of Rights: Creation and Reconstruction,” by that leading constitutional scholar, current Southmayd Professor of Law at Yale University, Akhil Reed Amar.

Beginning on page 51, he explains: “Several modern scholars have read the (second) amendment as protecting only arms bearing in organized ‘state militias,’ like SWAT teams and National Guard units. …

“This reading doesn’t quite work. The states’-rights reading puts great weight on the word militia, but the word appears only in the amendment’s subordinate clause. The ultimate right to keep and bear arms belongs to “the people,” not the states. As the language of the Tenth Amendment shows, these two are of course not identical: when the Constitution means ‘states,’ it says so.

“Thus, as noted above, ‘the people’ at the core of the Second Amendment are the same people at the heart of the Preamble and the First Amendment. Elbridge Gerry put the point nicely in the First Congress, in language that closely tracked the populist concern about governmental self-dealing at the root of earlier amendments: ‘This declaration of rights, I take it, is intended to secure the people against the mal-administration of the Government.’

“What’s more, the ‘militia,’ as used in the amendment and in clause 16, had a very different meaning two hundred years ago than in ordinary conversation today. Nowadays, it is quite common to speak loosely of the National Guard as the ‘state militia,’ but two hundred years ago, any band of paid, semiprofessional, part-time volunteers, like today’s Guard, would have been called “a select corps” or “select militia” — and viewed in many quarters as little better than a standing army.

“In 1789, when used without any qualifying adjective, ‘the militia’ referred to all citizens capable of bearing arms. The seeming tension between the dependent and the main clauses of the Second Amendment thus evaporates on closer inspection — the “militia” is identical to “the people” in the core sense described above. Indeed, the version of the amendment that initially passed the House, only to be stylistically shortened in the Senate, explicitly defined the militia as ‘composed of the body of the People.’ This is clearly the sense in which ‘the militia’ is used in clause 16 and throughout The Federalist, in keeping with standard usage confirmed by contemporaneous dictionaries, legal and otherwise. As Tench Coxe wrote in a 1788 Pennsylvania essay, ‘Who are the militia? Are they not ourselves?’

“How do they know it was the dearest wish of Thomas Jefferson’s heart that teen-age drug dealers should cruise the cities of this nation perforating their fellow citizens with assault rifles?”

That was obviously not TJ’s intention, nor does anyone claims that it was. No one advocates that “teen-age drug dealers should cruise the cities of this nation perforating their fellow citizens with assault rifles” That’s not what the debate is about. With this remark, she is now wearing the dunce cap.

“But letting the noisy minority in the National Rifle Association force
us to allow this carnage to continue is just plain insane.”

When gang-bangers shoot each other, libtards seek to shift the locus of responsibility away from the criminal and onto anything or anybody else – the gun, the NRA, “society.”

She repeats the meme that we should regulate guns like cars with licenses and registration. Evidently she was too stupid to know that this would lead to the greatest deregulation of firearms since passage of the Freedman’s Act of 1868.
See Eugene Volokh, “Okay, Let’s Regulate Guns like Cars”http://fee.org/anythingpeaceful/okay-lets-regulate-guns-like-cars/

Akhil Reed Amar takes an extreme position on constitutional law to support his philosophical inclinations, much like Scalia and Bork, and is considered a “unorthodox and, in some ways, iconoclastic constitutional scholar at Yale Law School, bucks dominant opinions on both sides of the political spectrum.” His opinions are not the dominant position of historians or legal scholars.

The links you have about regulating guns like automobiles are pretty much straw man arguments. In order to drive you much carry insurance and pass tests. That is not the case with guns and is permitted by the constitution.

In fact, all of your arguments are straw man arguments, I recognize that militia was and is not the national guard, or anything controlled by the feds, that is one of the purposes of the 2nd Amendment. But that is different than the arguments by the NRA and most gun nuts who misinterpret “shall not be infringed.” See the Scalia opinion supporting overturning DC’s restrictions on gun ownership, which despite his overlooking two hundred years of previous decisions he recognized reasonable regulations but just felt DC went too far.

SirVesa

You’re obviously wrong (about your comment and about Constitutional scholars). Tell me this, nut-job: where in the Constitution is the federal government given the authority to regulate gun ownership? What branch has this authority? Through what mechanism do they have the ability to exert this control? You’ve been going for days showing what a pseudo-intellectual clown you are: how about changing to a more amusing subject because you’re becoming quite a bore.

Gary Denton

This authority is long recognized. The common law as received from Britain at the time of the ratification of the US Constitution recognized and permitted such reasonable restrictions on the right to bear arms. Starting with the invention of modern weapons just over a hundred years ago some weapons were not permitted civilian ownership as having no legitimate purpose except for criminal or deadly anti-state activity and these laws have been repeatedly upheld and you cannot find even the the far right members of the Supreme Court who would question the ability to regulate those weapons.

SirVesa

OMG…get a life, dude. You lost the debate just like the rest of you anti-gunners lose sofa king always. When your proof is your opinion, you are adding nothing to the argument. Unless you can enumerate a power that gives them the authority, then you’re plainly an idiot douche-nozzle. Jiminy Cricket, you’re dense.

Gary Denton

By the way, you might check Article 1, Section 8 of the Constitution as who had the right to regulate guns and call out the militia. with the militia being all able-bodied men. It is explicitly given to the Federal government.

“To provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions;

To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the Militia, and for governing such Part of them as may be employed in the Service of the United States, reserving to the States respectively, the Appointment of the Officers, and the Authority of training the Militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress;

MollyB

Not even close…providing training and leadership is not the same thing as regulating gun ownership. I have to agree with Cervesa…you’re incredibly dense.

Edit: sorry…SirVesa.

Gary Denton

You are demonstrating your lack of reading comprehension again.
The states provide the leadership and training but “organizing, arming, and disciplining” is the federal responsibility and it is clear that is “regulating” as in “well-regulated militia” – which you previously wrote you were under the impression meant something different back then..

MollyB

I take that as a compliment since you clearly mean comprehending meaning that isn’t there. “Organizing, arming, and disciplining” are NOT the same thing is regulating gun ownership. I recommend you never try to represent yourself in court; someone even 1/6 my ability will absolutely destroy you. And even worse: you don’t know when you’re beaten and when to shut your mouth. So keep digging your grave. Its almost as entertaining as watching you try to act smug when your arguments are completely countered at every turn. You sir, are a fool.

Gary Denton

Lack of reading comprehension, you wrote “providing training and leadership”, which Article 1, Section 8 gives to the states, not the federal government.

MollyB

duh. I was making the point that you have provided NO evidence that the Federal government has the Constitutional authority to regulate gun ownership. I’ll save you some time with your research: they do NOT have the authority. You are mistaken.

Gary Denton

Militias are supposed to be “well regulated.” Let’s return to Article 1 Section 8. Among the enumerated powers of Congress, it is authorized to “To make Rules for the Government and Regulation of the land and naval Forces; To provide for calling forth the Militia to execute the Laws of the Union, suppress Insurrections and repel Invasions” and “To provide for organizing, arming, and disciplining, the Militia, and for governing such Part of them as may be employed in the Service of the United States, reserving to the States respectively, the Appointment of the Officers, and the Authority of training the Militia according to the discipline prescribed by Congress.” Apparently Congress gets to decide who gets what weapons, not individuals.

When the Constitution discusses individuals, it refers to “persons”, when it refers to “people” it is not referring to individuals but collectively. The “people” refers to a collective right to bear arms and the 2nd Amendment is placing limits on the federal government but not, as conservative Justice Scalia makes clear, bestowing an unlimited power to possess all possible weaponry to individuals, “the right secured by the Second Amendment is not unlimited.”

The Constitution mandates action to “promote the general welfare” and
places reasonable limitations on all the rights in the Bill of Rights.

MollyB

Again, you’re absolutely wrong. You keep trying to prove you’re right by making statements that have nothing to do with what you’re trying to prove. Deciding which guns can be made available (which is still un-Constitutional) is a whole different animal than regulating ownership. Is English your first language or do you just not understand words longer than four letters?

Also, I’ll reiterate since you missed it the first time: punctuation matters. If I replace a few nouns in the 2A: “A well balanced breakfast, being necessary to a
nutritional diet, the Right of the people to keep and eat food shall not be
infringed” Who has the Right to keep and eat food? The breakfast? Or
the People? Come on, dude. You can’t be this dense, so I’m assuming you’re just being contrary because your delicate sensibilities are offended by guns. You’re trying to create powers that are NOT enumerated by the Constitution which is, by definition, reserved by the State and by the People with the 10th and 9th Amendments. Normally I would say you need to read the Constitution, but you’ve already tried and failed so maybe stick to Archie comics. Constitutional law may be a little advanced for you. Any judge I’ve ever met would have you tossed out of his court with such a weak understanding of law. Cheesy Pete…you can’t even admit when you’re beaten, especially to yourself. Let me say it slowly: The U.S. Constitution. You’re. Doing. It. Wrong.

BillMiller66

Amar’s political views are a bit to the left. You’d know that if you read his book. Have you ever heard of Lawrence Tribe? He’s a law professor at Harvard, and yet another liberal constitutional scholar who agrees that the 2nd Amendment protects an individual right. And Sanford Levinson, professor of law at UT-Austin. Go read his The Embarrassing Second Amendment/

Scalia overlooked 200 years of previous decisions? Up until Heller, the last time the US Supreme Court considered was Miller v. US in 1939. It doesn’t matter how many times liberals like Ivins lie about it, the Supremes did NOT rule that the 2nd Amendment protection was afforded only to members of a state militia. Any adult capable of reading comprehension can see that.

My links are not at all strawman arguments. When liberals say that they want to regulate guns like cars, I turn around and ask them, “So my concealed carry license would be recognized in all 50 states JUST LIKE MY DRIVER LICENSE?” And they always get that same confused look on their face that says “oh wait…I didn’t really think this through…”

I can walk into a car dealership and buy a new car without a federal background check. Driver licenses are granted on a shall-issue basis. In other words, you don’t have to demonstrate “need.” It’s not some privilege reserved only for the Donald Trumps of the world.

Obviously liberals do NOT want guns regulated like cars. When they say that they do, they are lying.

Gary Denton

Again – the individual right to own a gun does not mean that right can’t be regulated. If you actually read instead of just spouting arguments you will see I have written that the individual right to own a gun is recognized.
I have not said and many of the liberals you are blasting do not say that the right to own a gun is limited to members of a state militia, this is a straw man argument.
Yes, because of great differences in licensing requirements in each state some states do not recognize out of state licenses. If there was a federal standard thy would.
You can not drive on public roads without tests and insurance, that is the manner liberals want guns regulated like cars. You are creating other arguments that don’t address what liberals really want because you don’t know anything about liberals.
I want guns regulated like cars – with ownership tests and liability laws like cars. I know a lot more about liberals than you and accusing liberals of lying is just demonstrating your ignorance.

BillMiller66

“with ownership test”

There are ownership tests to buy a car? That’s news to me.

“I want guns regulated like cars…”

I can walk into a car dealership and buy a car without am FBI background check.

You’re a liar.

Gary Denton

You can buy as many cars as you want after filing out the paperwork, you just can’t bring them unto the public without driving tests and liability insurance. Same as weapons should be regulated.

You and your fellow comrades seem to be reduced to insults and claims I am a liar.

BillMiller66

Sounds like you have never purchased a firearm. Before you can buy a gun at Carter’s Country, you have to undergo an FBI background check. Very unlike, say, buying a car at Don McGill Toyota.

You’re upset that someone called you out on your lies? Gary, do you even read what you write? Go read your very first post in this thread, you damned hypocrite!

BillMiller66

Remind us how you intend to get criminal to register their guns. Oh that’s right, criminals are legally exempt from gun registration laws. Haynes vs. U.S. 390 U.S. 85, 1968.

As far as crime prevention goes, gun registration does not work. I guess you missed that part in the 2004 NAS report. The only purpose served by gun registration is gun confiscation.

Gary Denton

We had already established that the NAS report does not say that.

Of course those who are prohibited from possessing guns don’t have to register guns, per Haynes and common sense.

Why would I want a criminal to register a gun, I want them unable to get a means of mass killing from a distance. Or do you disagree which you seem to be arguing for.

BillMiller66

The NAS found no evidence that gun registration reduces gun
crime.

Where has gun registration ever had a positive impact on
crime?

Not in California. California has had handgun registration since 1909 and it has not had any impact on violent crime rate. Source: FBI, Uniform Crime Reports, via the Data Online data analysis tool on the website of the Bureau of Justice Statistics.

Not in New Zealand. They repealed their gun registration law in the 1980s after police acknowledged its worthlessness. Source: Background to the Introduction of Firearms User Licensing Instead of Rifle and Shotgun Registration Under the Arms Act 1983 (Wellington, New Zealand: n.p., 1983).

Not in Australia. One report states, “It seems just to be an elaborate system of arithmetic with no tangible aim. Probably, and with the best of intentions, it may have been thought, that if it were known what firearms each individual in Victoria owned, some form of control may be exercised, and those who were guilty of criminal misuse could be readily identified. This is a fallacy, and has been proven not to be the case.” Source: Registration Firearms System, Chief Inspector Newgreen, CRB File 39-1-1385/84.

In addition, cost to Australian taxpayers exceeded $200 million annually. Source: The Failed Experiment: Gun Control and Public Safety in Canada, Australia, England and Wales, Gary Mauser, The Fraser Institute, 2003.

Not in Canada.
• The provincial governments of Alberta, Saskatchewan, and Manitoba have dumped both the administration and the enforcement of all federal
gun-control laws right back into Ottawa’s lap, throwing the Canadian government into a paper civil war.

• And all at a cost more than 1,646% the original projected cost (the original cost was estimated at 5% of all police expenditures in Canada). Source: Ottawa Under Pressure Over Gun Registry Fiasco, David Ljunggren, Reuters, December 4, 2002.

“The gun registry as it sits right now is causing law abiding citizens to register their guns but it does nothing to take one illegal gun off the street or to increase any type of penalty for anybody that violates any part of the legislation,” according to Al Koenig, President, Calgary Police
Association. Source: Calgary Herald, September 1, 2000.

“We have an ongoing gun crisis, including firearms-related homicides lately in Toronto, and a law registering firearms has neither deterred these crimes nor helped us solve any of them,” according to Toronto police Chief Julian Fantino. Source: Opponents increase pressure to halt Canada’s gun control program, Associated Press, Jan 3, 2002.

• The system was so bad that six Canadian provinces (British Columbia, Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta, Nova Scotia, and Ontario) refused to
prosecute firearm owners who fail to register. Victoria won’t enforce firearms act, Vancouver Sun, June 06, 2003.

• A bill to abolish the registry has been tabled (introduced) in the Canadian Parliament, which if passed, would eliminate the registry completely. Source: An Act to amend the Criminal Code and the Firearms Act, Received first reading June 19, 2006.

• A Saskatchewan MP who endorsed the long gun registry when first proposed has introduced legislation to abolish it stating that, “[the registry] has not saved one life in Canada, and it has been a financial sinkhole … absolutely useless in helping locate the 255,000 people who have been prohibited from owning firearms by the courts.” Source: $2 billion worth of police will save more lives than one gun registry, Garry Breitkreuz, National Post, February 27, 2009.

• In April, 2012, the Canadian long gun registry was terminated.

Not in Germany. The Federal Republic of Germany began comprehensive gun registration in 1972. The government estimated that between 17,000,000 and 20,000,000 guns were to be registered, but only 3,200,000 surfaced, leaving 80% unaccounted for. Source: Why Gun Registration will Fail, Ted Drane, Australian Shooters Journal, May 1997.

Not in Boston, Cleveland, or California. These cities and state require registration of “assault weapons.” The compliance rate in Boston and Cleveland is about 1%. Source: The Samurai, the Mountie, and the Cowboy: Should America Adopt the Gun Controls of Other Democracies, David B. Kopel, 231, n.210 (1992).

Fact: Criminals don’t register their guns, nor are they legally required to do so.

The only people who register their firearms are law-abiding rule-followers, i.e., the very people we don’t need to worry about.

Does gun registration play a role in crime solving? Registration is required in Hawaii, Chicago and Washington DC. Has there been a single case in which registration was instrumental in identifying someone who committed a crime? I’ve asked gun control advocates that simple question many times. No one has ever been able to provide me WITH EVEN ONE CASE.

So why do the advocates of victim-disarmament push registration? Because firearm registration is the first step to their ultimate goal: confiscation. Want examples? Canada, Germany, Australia, California, New York City, Bermuda, Cuba, Greece, Jamaica, Ireland, and Soviet

Its Federal law, you ignorant douche!!! Get your information from somewhere besides HuffPo.

mark wyatt

only from commercial dealers . The shows are predominately individuals where no check is required . I have many guns including a collection of weatherbys , I finished my second series collection with a 7mm rifle I bought at a show , I didn’t even show a license . Ive been to shows at dallas market hall . One of the nations largest .

Bmac

There must not be many places you can go…

don76550

Excellent. I will patronize them and I don’t want an anti American piece of liberal garbage near me.

Indiana Pearl

Aracept can help you, old feller. Don’t shoot yourself in the foot.

crazy2medic

So no walmart or kroger for you? what exactly is the difference if my shirt is over the gun or under it? The gun is still there wether you can see it or not!
By DPS current records there will be 950,000 LTC in Texas by the first of the year, it’s going to be tough to avoid people carrying guns!

Sharon Brucks

Im thinking some people are just more frightened than others and feel braver with that gun on their chest.

ForeverBanned

Or maybe some have had different life experiences than you and are a mite more in touch with the reality that evil walks among good people and we never know when we might be forced to defend ourselves. I’m glad that your life experiences have been so rose-colored that you didn’t think of that. For the rest of us, we deal with reality.

Sharon Brucks

Uh huh…how many times have you been attacked? Sorry, I don’t trust you any more than I trust any other paranoid “they’re coming to get us” nut. Go pack your gun and let others know just how small your penis is!

ForeverBanned

My penis is so small it’s non-existent, dumplin’. But, then, I’m a woman so I wouldn’t have it any other way. I don’t have to justify to you my right to defend myself in situations which you deny even exist. It’s my right, and you can’t touch it.

I love how MY freedom drives liberals batty!

CJ Grisham

The Trace? Really Texas Monthly? This is a Bloomberg funded Gun control front group disguised as a “news” outlet. They don’t even hide it.

Chibo Viejo

ok, now we see why you’re so adamant against reasonable gun control like mental health checks…smdh

Texas_Squidbilly

The word reasonable is tossed around a lot by BHO. The reason for the opposition is that the government can label whoever they want mentally defunct and stop them from owning a firearm. Crazies shouldn’t own firearms, but the government sucks too bad at EVERYTHING it does to make that determination.

crazy2medic

CJ note the hysteria and unreasoning fear on display by the gun control crowd, while the normal people are calm and articulate in their reponses

gordon smith

you mean hysteria and unreasoning fear on display by the gun lover crowd?

MollyB

What do we have to be afraid of?

Bmac

Apparently terrorists. Mayors and Governors didn’t want Syrian refugees to come to their states because they are p!$$, yellow, scared of poor terrorists. They were ALL gung-ho about attacking the United States Army during Jade Helm, but run like little pansies behind their bureaucratic masters at the mention of “slam” and “refugee.”

crazy2medic

Might as well accept the fact it’s the law in Texas and their is NOTHING you can do about it

mark wyatt

I wonder if they will let black people open carry in Tx ?. I think in the beginning they’ll fake it but after a while it’ll just be open season on blacks with guns for these uber-racist’ Texans and they’ll have to reverse this law . I believe were going to see one black after another shot and needlessly gunned down in cold blood with the white redneck claiming some b/s story relying on tx’s hidden white privilege immunity . I guarantee you it will no longer be safe to be a muslim here in head scarf or anyone that looks middle-eastern , Indian , Hassidic Jew etc , theres just too many bat-shit crazy Ted Nugent types here . I myself will not go into stores , restaurants , theaters etc that allow open carry . Period . Lets these people who are so afraid of others have their own establishments , like Applebys , tacobell and Minyards . This is a bad idea , but hey , when your “Texas” and you let Jesus take the wheel this is what you get.

Martin Cohn

Wow, and nope its not about race. Its about Civil Rights.

mark wyatt

Well obviously its a civil rights issue , Im saying here in Texas its not going to go well . I give it a year .

Texas_Squidbilly

I’ll take that bet. I’ll put some dirty oil refinery money on it.

MollyB

Funny how the biggest racists seem to be the ones that dream up new ways to oppress other races. Texas will do just fine, sweetie. It will be as much of a non-event as in the other 44 states in the Union. A$$hats like you will just have to find other reasons to be offended.

gordon smith

yeah – from the state with a Governor and Senator who think Jade Helm may be a real threat – “I’m not sure Texas will do just fine, sweetie”

MollyB

We’ll see. All of your sleepless nights will be for nothing. Find something else to be scared about, Nancy.

mark wyatt

Im white . My nanny was my mom . My two true heroes are Jimi Hendrix and Stevie Wonder . Im a guitar playing grandfather of six . Not a racist .I would welcome the refugee’s from Syria had I the space , would you ?

MollyB

Does this train of thought have a caboose or is this supposed to be some sort of defense against you being a racist? Telling blacks and middle-eastern folks not to do something that they have a perfectly legal right to do simply because of their skin color is the definition of racism. We all have a right or we don’t.

Bmac

Molly, a 12 year old Black Kid got blasted on and killed because he had a TOY GUN. In the video, he didn’t even have it in his hands before they killed him.

There are social experiment videos out there that prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that if a black person walks the street with a rifle strapped to his back and handguns on his waist, they will not only arrest him, but confiscate the weapons; they even got 6 or more squad cars line up on him and pull their weapons. (albeit this was Florida and not Texas.) On the same street with similar weapons, the white guy only gets a talking to by one cop and they let him go along his merry way.

Sorry “sweetie” there is an unspoken addendum to Open Carry that says it’s only for white folks. Why do you think the only people who practice Open Carry are white?

MollyB

That has absolutely NOTHING to do with skin color. For every video you show me of an overreaction to a black person carrying a gun, I can show you dozens pertaining to white people. Mr. Grisham himself is a good example. That is simply a by-product of panicky pansies like you losing your dang mind over the sight of a gun.

BillMiller66

Tamir Rice walked around in public pointing a pellet gun a people. The officers reported that upon their arrival, Rice reached towards the gun in his waistband. gun was later found to be an Airsoft replica from which someone (Tamir?) had removed the orange safety feature marking it as a replica and not a true firearm

So little Tamir had his junior gang-banger starter kit, and amused himself by pointing his “gun” at people in public. We can just imagine the thrill he got from watching the fear in people’s eyes as they scurried off.

Moral of the story: play stupid games, wins stupid prizes.

mark wyatt

Oh , I get it you misunderstood my post . Shut up and please go away , you’re not helping common discourse .

MollyB

You right like a sixth-grader and I’m the one that needs to shut up?

Bmac

Right, all the ethics that have guns that *I* have spoken to, have already said they wouldn’t dare Open Carry for fear that they’ll be shot.

Martin Cohn

Yup cause that’s what has happened in the other 44 states that currently have Open Carry.

mark wyatt

Ohio I believe is an open carry state . Can you explain then why 12 yr old Tamir Rice was killed in the park with a plastic toy gun ? Tx is just to mired in blatant racism to uphold these laws fairly . The courts dockets will be full of non-cases where the cops have illegally confiscated blacks weapons while adhering to the “no questioning of permits for open carry” clause for whites . Theres no way they will let blacks and anyone that doesn’t look lilly white Christian open carry in legal places like malls , restaurants ,parks etc . in TX! The cops will be killing them as well as will the populace thinking they’ll receive the benefit of white priviledge doubt . Would you trust a Ted Nugent type that claims he shot the Indian man b/c he thought he was a muslim open carrying and felt threatened ? That’s hypothetically what your going see repeated again and again .

mark wyatt

People like Molly make my point , she posts like she’s ready to fire already .

MollyB

Actually, I don’t carry, Buttercup. I just enjoy taking money from people who think they can use the law as a form of activism.

mark wyatt

sweetie and buttercup ? what does that mean when talking to strangers ? it’s really creepy . Are you lonely ?

And more opinions and feelings vs a Constitutionally protected Civil Right.

willid3

since we are going back to wild wild west lets just let every one have a gun that wants one, and the police can only show up after the crimes and mayhem have happened. that way no one has their ‘rights’ infringed on. course that may end up shrinking the state from 20+ million down to 5+ million (or is 500,000). course we might also have that economy too, as economics doesnt care about ‘rights’, or really even providing what you paid for. not really

but since i have right to not do business where open carry is just fine, and for those who want the reverse can do what ever they want .

Texas_Squidbilly

Why would it be the “wild wild west”? The only difference now is that a shirt won’t be required to cover the sea of concealed handguns that are already around you everyday. Quit drinking that liberal kool-aid and read for yourself. The law changes very little. Many will choose to keep it concealed and the sky will not fall.

gordon smith

shirt or baggy pants

MollyB

You mean the Hollywood version of the wild wild west? Or the real life wild wild west where every man, woman, and child knew how to shoot and had ready access to guns? The one where Hollywood shows shootouts in the street every Tuesday, or the one where public shootings were rare because anyone that pulled a gun usually had a couple dozen pointed back at them? The one where outlaws like Billy the Kid kill hundreds of people with super-human skill, or the one where Billy only killed about 8 people, was only an outlaw for a few years before being killed, and was a coward with no morals that usually ambushed his victims like a coward.

willid3

the real one, the one where the ‘law man’ in one city was the bank robber in the next. the one where you were as likely to die from being in ‘town’ where dead horses littered the streets where they had died and no one did any thing with them. almost all of what was in holly weird’s version of the west were way to cleaned up to be real. along with most of their versions of life too.

but most of those movies (and TV shows) had to be cleaned up or they wouldnt be shown. and stuff that is shown today we think is radical compared to then?> actually what we know of that is wrong as you can find almost any thing from old days just as grungy as today

Gary Denton

Like the governor MollyB specializes in fake history.

Read Mark Twain where he talks about how many deaths there were each week in the small towns he worked as a reporter because every drunk had a gun and criminals who got short of money realized all they had to do was point a gun. Why do you think it was called “The Wild West”?

Robert A Heinlein was wrong, an armed society is not a polite society. It is a society where your crazy neighbor can kill you or a family member from a distance by shooting them in the back.

MollyB

oh boy…you have no end to your ignorance do you? Sure, let’s use the words of a fiction writer and well-known satirist (as well as a master liar) to support your distorted view of history. Unfortunately for you, the actual data shows that the average murder rate (all murders, not just guns) for major cities was 1.5….not million…just 1.5…for the period of 1876 to 1885, which translates to .165 percent of the population. You lefties like to live in your fantasy world a feelings and supposition, but you can’t change history. Your last statement shows lack of critical thinking once again: where does this happen? Sack-up and stop jumping at imaginary threats.

You seem to be laboring under the delusion that all the gun rights folks and the Supreme Court got it wrong. I’m assuming you got your information from a fine journalistic outlet like Mother Jones or perhaps you bought into the Heller decision. However, if you read Federalist 29 the meaning of “well-regulated militia” is quite clear (because they would certainly give the government all the military power…after just fighting a revolution against a great military power…um…yeah). Also, you can read the original draft of the 2nd Amendment as well as why Hamilton changed it, so that it would be absolutely clear that the intent was for the PEOPLE to maintain their right to self-defense and to guard against tyranny. But you won’t because you’re an idealogue who is convinced he is right. All in all, it doesn’t change a thing. Guns are legal and will continue to be so. They’ll be around to p!ss-off and terrify geniuses like you forever. Next-stop: Constitutional Carry in the great State of Texas. So get off your tail and do something to stop us, you whiny little girl.

Gary Denton

You seem to be laboring under some delusions and selected cherry picking of facts.

“An adult who lived in Dodge City from 1876 to 1885 faced at least a 1 in 61 chance of being murdered — 1.65 percent of the population was murdered in those 10 years. An adult who lived in San Francisco, 1850-1865, faced at least a 1 in 203 chance of being murdered, and in the eight other counties in California that have been studied to date, at least a 1 in 72 chance.” – Homicide Rates in the American West by Randolph Roth.

It has been pointed out that the battle of the OK Corral occurred because the Earps were trying to enforce the town’s gun laws. Like many Western towns of that era guns had to be turned into the sheriff until you left town. If you want to go back to the Wild, Wild West, is that how we should start?

Many people had weapons in the West, they generally were not able to carry them within city limits. In towns without such limits, the murder rate was significantly higher. These towns had very small populations and frequent gun incidents leading to most severely restricting guns.

This is discussed in a fact checker article on gun crimes in the Old West if you want to look it up.

You seem to be the whiny little girl who has her facs wrong.

SirVesa

More ignorant drivel. Molly’s facts were right…your’s are so contorted to fit your narrative that they don’t even resemble facts anymore. Tombstone and San Francisco had gun bans and had some of the worst gun crime…are you sofa king stupid you can’t see the correlation? The truth is that MOST cities did NOT have gun bans and gun crime was NOT prevalent. Pick up a [email protected] book, you imbecile.

Gary Denton

I am sorry, you have become a blithering blustering idiot, who can only issue insults.

MollyB

Insults are the appropriate response to trolling. His facts are correct, yours are not. So you’re either willfully ignorant or you are purposely trying to mislead for your own warped purposes. Either way, sack-up Princess. This is no time for you to go all delicate when all those meanies out there have guns.

itsmefool

In case you haven’t noticed, police have been showing up after crimes have been committed since, well, there have been police! You don’t actually think we’re in a “Minority Report” world now, do ya?

willid3

no

but at least they do show up. go back far enough and they never did. and there wasnt all that much in the way of patrolling going on in the past either. and unless some one happen to see the crime, it was also unlikely that there would be an arrest or a conviction.

BillMiller66

“the police can only show up after the crimes and mayhem have happened.”

Fact: 95% of the time police arrive, too late to prevent a crime or arrest the suspect.
Source: This is 911 … please hold, Witkin, Gordon, Guttman, Monika and Lenzy, Tracy. U.S. News & World Report, June 17, 1998

Remind us again what planet you’re living on.

Rational

The challenge is how to distinguish a “good guy” vs a “bad guy” who openly carries handguns in public. MAJORITY of adults, teens and children were raised/taught to view anyone openly carrying a firearm with alarm and suspicion, unless they are in uniform (law enforcement and military) or at the hunting or shooting range. Thus, 911 operators need to be ready to receive a flood of calls.

This “open carry” combined with “stand your ground” laws may also create a needlessly dangerous, lethal situation. For example, what if someone walks into a restsurant openly carrying a firearm, and another patron feels threatened and decides to shoot the open carry patron, invoking “self-defense” via stand your ground? Alot of people WILL feel threatened at the sight of an armed civilian openly carrying a firearm, regardless of whether the threat is perceived or real.

crazy2medic

That is the stupidest scenario I ever heard, anybody that can legally carry conceal can also carry open, if you have a permit then you know the law and what you can and cannot do! Why would a person with that is carrying concealrd feel threaten by somebody carrying open? That is just idiocy, I will carry open and concealed depebding on the weather, the circumstances, and my own comfort. People like you will just have to cope with your hoplophobia because it is now the law in Texas!

Rational

Laws can be changed, if required. ALOT of people who see people openly carrying a firearm will be calling 911.

Hope that most CHLs will be sensible enough to continue carrying concealed. Openly carrying will also make you a conspicuous target for potential criminals, as they will take OCLs out first….

MollyB

Makes you a target? Nonsense. Doesn’t happen in the other 44 states that allow open carry. Your over-active imagination is causing you to fear perceived threats and ignore real threats. Seek professional help immediately.

Rational

Look how great open carry worked in Colorado Springs, where a criminal was allowed to shoot innocent victims because the 911 operator dismissed an earlier warning call from a witness due to this negligent law.

Any firearm owner (not in uniform) who foolishly decides to open carry publicly should be aware that they will be perceived as a potential criminal/public threat, and reported to 911.

MollyB

I’ll concede your point if you can provide evidence of a similar scenario. In order for there to be a pattern, you must have more than one. An isolated incident is not proof that the vast majority of law-abiding carriers regularly go on shooting rampages.

You go right ahead and call 911…I’ll make sure to send your wife a Christmas card with all the money I take from you for conspiring to violate my rights. Should be a simple case, especially since you are advertising your intent on the Internet. What a buffoon.

Rational

Calling 911 due to a perceived threat such as witnessing a non-uniformed civilian openly carrying a firearm in a “suspicious” manner is not illegal. Again, how can we tell the difference between a “good guy” and a “bad guy” openly carrying?

MollyB

You are incorrect, sir. Are you willing to bet your livelihood on your OPINION? The same burden of proof is on you in the court of law as a law enforcement officer. You have to prove why it is “suspicious” for a law-abiding citizen to carry a gun in public.

MollyB

You are incorrect, sir. Its called filing a false report. Are you willing to bet your livelihood on your OPINION? The same burden of proof is on you in the court of law as a law enforcement officer. You have to prove why it is “suspicious” for a law-abiding citizen to carry a firearm in public.

MollyB

The good guy will be the one not perpetrating the felony. As long as that firearm is holstered, you have no legal right to your “suspicion”. Try it…the only way folks like you will learn is when it starts costing you. You don’t get the right to decide what rights another person can observe.

Rational

No. Attached are guidelines for calling 911 regarding open carry, which includes observation of “suspicious” behavior of gun owners (“suspicious” is vague and undefined)

Again, you are incorrect. If the person does not have their weapon unholstered, does not appear intoxicated, is not committing a crime, or is not trespassing, then the burden of proof is on you and you are committing a class B misdemeanor in the state of Texas which carries a fine of up to $2000 and up to 180 days in jail. Like I said, put your money where your mouth is. Let’s see how fanatical you really are. Or you can let folks go about their business and stop trying to be a turd.

“The gun owner is committing a crime OR acting recklessly or suspicious.”

MollyB

The third bullet is EXACTLY why as a prosecutor I would kick your tail in court.

“Mr. Rational, would you please describe to the Court exactly what about the Plaintiff’s behavior you found “suspicious?”

“Well, he had a gun.”

Molly smiles and counts her cash.

The police chiefs and the media do not get to add their own interpretation of the verbiage or intent of the law. There’s no doubt in my mind I could beat you in court. I suggest you speak with a legal professional before committing to an ill-advised course of action that could put you in jail. We actually just won a case where the 911 operator dispatch police because the caller said “they have guns and something’s not right with them”. The officers showed up, found nothing wrong, and left. The gentleman sued her and won because she couldn’t articulate any viable suspicion and actually said “normal people don’t carry guns in public”. She was given a deferred sentence and had to pay court costs and legal fees. So again: put your money where your mouth is if you’re so sure of yourself. 🙂

Rational

Well, madam, let us wait and see how people will react to Texas open carry starting next year.

Although majority of CHLs are law-abiding, there are several who are not, as there are several cases of vigilante behavior (i.e. woman shooting at shoplifters) and negligent discharges (i.e. man shooting himself in the leg in a movie theater.) The high number of negligent discharges (almost 2000), children/teens getting injured or killed with firearms (over 3000) with toddlers shooting someone on a weekly basis this year, does not engender public trust in U.S. armed civilians.

Moreover, CHL proficiency requirements only include basic firearm safety and marksmanship using B27 inanimate targets, with ZERO tactics. This is inadequate for successfully defending against a “real world” armed attack while ensuring the safety of innocent bystanders.

Thus, the public generally perceives untrained armed civilians as a liability/potential threat in contrast to formally trained law enforcement officers/military personnel.

MollyB

Thank you for your opinion. All of this nonsense will go away when folks like you and law enforcement organizations get tired of getting sued by citizens engaged in lawful behavior.

willid3

whats the point of filing a law suit unless some one has money? those that do may win by default, but get 0 for their money
its kind of like the older white guy who calls the cops because he see a black teenager walking down the street. does the black teenager have cause to sue? according to you they do

MollyB

Absolutely they do.

willid3

ok point an example of the black teenager filing a suit against a older white person. and winning too. and getting the money (not a judgement)

willid3

its not a ‘false’ report if its your opinion. a false report if filing a crime report where nothing at all happened (say like swatting). or reporting a fire where none existed.

MollyB

There is no opinion in law, my friend. If you can’t articulate a valid “suspicion” that will convince a jury, you WILL lose. Trust me.

willid3

and why in the world would i do that? you are obviously biased in you opinion.

MollyB

Then don’t take my word for it. If you want to test the law, go for it. I’ll be happy to take your money. You’re not likely to do jail time (though it is a possibility), but there’s a good chance you will lose and you will be responsible for paying court and legal fees.

willid3

and i will happy to take yours when you file that illegitimate law suite. Texas tends to frown on frivolous law suits

MollyB

Interesting that you consider violating a person’s Constitutional rights as illegitimate and frivolous. But not surprising.

willid3

there is nothing but opinion in the law.

MollyB

If you believe that, then that is why you will lose. The probable cause definitions apply not just to LEOs, but anyone making an accusation.

willid3

but consider this then. we have had many examples of police killing unarmed people. and almost never do we see them even being charged with a crime now do we? and thats because the SCOTUS has ruled that if a police officer feels threatened that is a defense. that what the law is now. and feeling threatened is an opinion.

MollyB

They still have to articulate the reason. There is no statute in any of the four states I have held license that say “feeling threatened” sanctions a deadly force response. LEOs are charged with a crime when the grand jury feels one is committed (due to evidence), not when the mob says one has. We have two pending cases at the moment where gun-control activists called 911 on open carriers (carrying rifles): I expect a significant increase in these cases since the language is more explicit in the new law as to what constitutes an infraction. IF the the firearm is holstered and the carrier is not obviously impaired, I will OWN you if you call the police on them. Thus endeth your free legal advice.

Chris

I need your info..

crazy2medic

Me too! Do you practice in the dallas/ft worth area?
You are my new hero!
Thank you!

Phil A.

Race, largely. The gun debate is secretly a racial one: if I decided to get a gun license and openly carry a firearm, as a member of the most feared race in America, how soon/often would I be questioned/jailed? While white folks tell me “you can’t do that, it’s well within my 2nd Amendment rights?”

this argument is stupid and has done nothing to stop mass shootings anywhere. More guns for no effects. Security theatre.

OldBlindBob

The percentage of criminal convictions of CHL holders in Texas in 2013 was 0.3106% of the total. CHL holders are perhaps the most law-abiding group in the state. It’s irrational to fear them, Rational.

OldBlindBob

If I were a “bad guy” I don’t think I’d open carry if I was on my way to do a dastardly deed. Bad guys want surprise working for them, not caution and confrontation working against them.

The problem of not knowing a legal CHL holder from any other open carry cowpoke is admittedly real. Is a CHL badge an answer?

MollyB

Funny…usually the people I see in favor of a CHL badge are the same ones against open carry. I do not support carry badges of any kind. Also, they would have to be so ludicrous as to not be perceived as law enforcement badges by a reasonable person or you would run the risk of being prosecuted for impersonating a LEO.

I think the prevailing wisdom should be that if the weapon is holstered, the carrier should be deemed not a threat. I find it ludicrous that concealed carriers are ok because they have a thin layer of cotton covering their weapon, but open carriers are somehow going to lose their minds and shoot up a place.

OldBlindBob

Basically, I agree, but the prevailing wisdom isn’t always as wise as yours. In some areas of the country, people have been conditioned to freak out at the sight of a gun. Out in Hill Country, no problem. In Austin, head for the safe space.

I can’t think of an answer. I just threw out the badge idea with similar concerns. I don’t wanna be a cop — or even look like one. A free chicken dinner to whoever comes up with a good solution.

BillMiller66

The liberals in Austin will just have to overcome their own entrenched hoplophobia. It can be done.

BillMiller66

I am old enough to remember when Texas first considered passing a concealed carry law in the early 1990s. Back then advocates of victim-disarmament laws like Molly Ivins would spin wild tales of “what-if” based on nothing more than their hyper-active imaginations. They claimed that allowing law-abiding citizens to get licensed to carry handguns would return Texas to the old Wild West. There would be shoot-outs over minor fender-benders. Arguments over parking spots would quickly escalate into blood in the streets.

The CHL law was passed, and their dire frightened predictions simply did not come to pass. The facts – as opposed to the perfervid fantasies of liberals – show quite clearly that Texans who hold CHLs are about 7.6 times less likely to be arrested of a violent crime.

Although CHL holders are law-abiding, majority are not proficient in tactics, required for successfully defending against an armed attack while ensuring safety of innocent bystanders.

Vigilante behavior, negligent discharges and homicides by CHLs are still reported regularly.

SirVesa

Horsesh!t…did you actually read the study? It said that violent crime rates decreased. In fact, the UCR shows a SIGNIFICANT decrease in violent crime since 1990 even as population has, in some cases, doubled. You, sir, are an idealogue. And not a very smart one either.

Rational

Did you read the study? Increased CHL permits had NOTHING to do with affecting crime, as they are not related.

SirVesa

You need to lay off the meth. Maybe YOU believe in coincidence, but some of use prefer logic. Get some…you’ll like it.

Also, that study referenced in your link has been busted by Texas Tribune and others as biased and incorrect. Even though they included statistics from the UCR, they included suicide with homicides. But these schools have posted their support of global warming science, so critical thinking isn’t their strong suit.

Rational

They included total firearm deaths, and separated them into firearm homicides and suicides. The firearm homicide rate remained steady since 2000, and the firearm suicide rate increases slightly. No evidence of bias.

SirVesa

I was actually talking about the hindawi.com reference, but the one from Pew Research is biased, too. They DID provide a separate statistic for suicide, but they included the suicide figures as homicides. THAT is why the study is biased. Remove the bias and the stats are not so much “flat”, but still on a gradual decline. Not entirely their fault, since the FBI likes to do that too. If you feel that suicide is in the same league as homicide, then this study and the other one you cited are good support for your argument.

Yes, as population increased. Does “per capita” mean nothing to you, Irrational?

Rational

Again, did you not read the study? Firearm homicide rate per capita (deaths per 100,000) declined since the 90’s, yet remained steady since 2000. You either have difficulty with reading comprehesion or refuse to accept facts when they contradict your personal opinions.

SirVesa

“Relatively flat” is the term they used, but still HALF of what it was. So its just a lucky cooincidence that gun ownership tripled during that time? You’re a humorous fella. Thanks for the chuckle. Easy to see how Obama got elected….twice.

MollyB

So…if what they claim is true (and I must say I’m leaning more towards believing SirVesa), even in the face of gun ownership tripling in the U.S, I guess that means that once and for all guns are not the problem.

So what’s your beef? Do you just prefer tyranny or are you afraid you’ll wet yourself at the sight of a gun? Buy some Depends and grow a spine…its the law and guns aren’t going anywhere any time soon.

BillMiller66

I don’t carry a a sidearm in order to “decrease the crime rate.” I carry in order to defend myself, my loved ones, and my lawfully-acquired property in the event that the need arises. When I lobbied my state senator and representative in the early 1990s, THAT was my argument, and that was the argument of my fellow advocates of self-defense.

Self defense is a-human-right.com. Do you agree or disagree?

A side benefit is that the states that adopted shall-issue concealed carry laws in the 1990s saw their violent crimes rates drop even further than the states that did not adopt such laws. This has been amply documented.

There is now evidence that Multiple victim public shootings drop in states that pass shall-issue CCW legislation. See “Multiple Victim Public Shootings, Bombings, and Right-to-Carry Concealed Handgun Laws: Contrasting Private and Public Law Enforcement” Lott and Landes.

George Zimmerman is alive to day because he had a CHL and a sidearm. I know people like you refer to George Zimmerman as a “vigilante.” In libspeak, a “vigilante” evidently means someone who used a firearm to defend himself against an Obama voter.

In Texas in the early 1990s there were fears among some people in law enforcement that adopting CHL enable mayhem, chaos, and blood in the streets.

“I lobbied against the law in 1993 and 1995 because I thought it would lead to wholesale armed conflict. That hasn’t happened. All the horror stories I thought would come to pass didn’t happen. No bogeyman. I think it’s worked out well, and that says good things about the citizens who have permits. I’m a convert.” – Glenn White, President of the Dallas Police Association, Dallas Morning News, December 23, 1997

“I … [felt] that such legislation present[ed] a clear and present danger to law-abiding citizens by placing more handguns on our streets. Boy was I wrong. Our experience in Harris County, and indeed statewide, has proven my fears absolutely groundless”. — John B. Holmes, Harris County Texas district attorney, Dallas Morning News, December 23, 1997

Fact: In 2007, there were 54 accidental gun deaths for children under age 13. About 12 times as many children died from drowning during the same period. More children die from accidents on their bicycles than from negligent discharges.

As far as homicides by CHLs go, have you even bothered to look at the numbers? Texas does keep track of the crime rates of concealed carriers. Last I checked there were about 800,000 Texans licensed to carry concealed. In 2013 there were 4 murders committed by CHLs. Show me a city with 800,000 inhabitants and only 4 homicides and I’ll show you one of the safest cities in the world.
In 200 Sturdevant published a study showing that overall, CHLs are 13 times less likely to commit any crime than the average Texan.

In 2004 the National Academy of Sciences issued a 328-page report based on 253 journal articles, 99 books, 43 government publications, a survey of 80 different gun-control laws and some of its own independent
study. In short, the panel could find no link between restrictions on gun ownership and lower rates of crime, firearms violence or even accidents with guns. http://www8.nationalacademies.org/onpinews/newsitem.aspx?RecordID=10881

“An unarmed man can only flee from evil, and evil is
not overcome by fleeing from it.” – Jeff Cooper

gordon smith

Is a pistol handle sticking out of the top of baggy pants considered open carry?

Chris

Only if it’s in a holster.

Roland Ramirez

My only concern is racial profiling. As a minority will it be more of a hassle to open carry, luckily I live in a city with a large Hispanic pop. so I haven’t had to deal with racism, but what about others? I doubt middle easterners who are Muslims with open carry do to there Islamiphobia going around, but for those who do to “prove a point” will they be targeted? There’s section 8 housing not fat from where I live, there’s black who walk to the nearby H-E-B and sometimes at night, will they be allowed to open carry without having a jogger especially at night calling 911? Will this lead to discrimination not just from cops but from white citizens?

As far as campus carry I don’t see it being a big deal, especially at UTSA where I went. Some of my friends were hunters, and they kept their guns back in their hometowns, not here. College kids don’t have a lot of money to buy guns especially with the cost of books. Besides I’m sure there probably gonna spend it on laptops, PS4’s, weed, probably more likely addirol or save it for spring break.
And also not to mention those who are in societies, clubs, Greek and/or academic fraternities, etc. You gotta pay gotta pay dues for some of these, sometimes monthly. That’ll take some of their money too.

BillMiller66

This is Texas; *everyone* is a minority.

“I doubt middle easterners who are Muslims with open carry do to there Islamiphobia [sic]…”

Islamophobia: a word created by fascists, and used by cowards, to manipulate morons.

Bmac

Fine, if they’re going to lift the ban on guns, then by thunder, lift the ban on full length swords and knives. I want to walk the street with my daisho. I am fully trained so it’s ok. There hasn’t been a sword related death in 200+ years.

MollyB

Several knives are no longer illegal in the state of Texas, and a new law makes knife preemption in municipalities illegal. Swords are still illegal, but if you’re gung-ho about it start your own activist group and change the legislation.

Chris

It’s actually legal to carry a sword with a chl.

SirVesa

The penal code still explicitly bans swords, as well as spears, throwing stars/darts/knives, daggers, and any knife with a blade over 5 1/2 inches.

Yes, 46.02 bans those, however, those carrying under chl are exempted from 46.02.

SirVesa

I’ve seen a lot of discussion about that, but since HB905 is the only thing that passed I would be reluctant to test that. I actually have a buddy that just had his CHL taken away and is pending an appearance in court because he had a hunting knife on his belt (and he was going hunting!!!). And I would wonder why someone with a CHL would want to carry a sword. Reminds me of that scene in Raiders of the Lost Ark.

I know another person who has been unable to get a CHL because they were convicted of having a sword (he was going to a cos-play event) . He contacted the ADA and asked if his record could be expunged since the law was changing and he was told “no, swords will still illegal”. To me its not worth it (since I don’t own any of the banned weapons, nor would I want to carry them if I did), but I’m sure someone will push the limit soon and get an answer for us.

Jed

so sword control works?

george phillips

my guess is that soon the law enforcement people,the stupid tx gov.and whoever sponsered this good ole red neck bill will find the answer to why over a hundred years ago in the west where everyone had a gun had to ck them in within city limits,yes my dear gun totting gun nuts even back then they knew not all gun totters where sane

BillMiller66

44 other states already allow open carry. Even Massachusetts allows open carry. Your fears are overblown.

Shawn Conway

I love it when Texas reminds liberals that they’re in Texas. Seriously, if you’re so wigged out about stuff like this, go somewhere that closer identifies with your ideals. Every state is different. Texas just happens to be a little bigger, tougher, and more badass than the rest. Sounds like a lot of you belong in someplace a little more…nanny.

willid3

odd how we have so many states with open carry. but almost none of them are alike. some require a license, some dont, some actually only have it in some counties (and only in those ). some allow the weapons to have ammunition others not so much.

This is not a problem in the 40 or so states where open carry exists. I recommend gun owners also carry a body camera along with their gun. There are far to many instances of police perjury and misconduct and these cameras will give you ammunition for civil lawsuits and criminal complaints against abusive police officers. Remember, police vocabulary contains words like “testilying” and “perjurmony.” Video camera have exposed police lies and false charges over and over. This is why they oppose citizens recording their activities. I also counsel gun owners to not be jerks and comply with police orders. They have a right to check your license. That is fine but if they become abusive jerks the place to address that is in court with a lawsuit, not on the street.

Hamsterbelly

It’s a silly concealed or not argument, if someones going on a kill spree, they’ll do it carrying or not, Like wise you/we don’t know who’s a bad guy or not. Not until the moment they decide to break the law!

Chris

SB17 did not pass, HB910 passed. Also, in regards to “it’s still unclear why they felt the need to protest what would soon be law.”:

Open carry protest: only licensed open carry passed, while these groups were protesting for Constitutional carry. Until this is passed, you will continue to see rifle protests.

Campus carry gun free zone protest: they were protesting to show that keeping parts of campus gun free will not make those areas safe, and that they should make all areas campus carry areas.

I am reminded of the quote from Plutarch’s lives from Gnaeus Pompeius Magnus, Pompey the Great, a Roman statesman and general. The quotes goes: “What will you never cease prattling of laws to us who carry swords by our sides!” Seem to me that open carry gun advocates feel that, with their guns, that they are the law.

BillMiller66

Oh really? Is that why in Texas, citizens with concealed carry licenses are 14 times less likely to commit a crime? They are also five times less likely to commit a violent crime.
Source: Texas Department of Public Safety and the U.S. Census Bureau, reported in San Antonio Express-News, September, 2000.

WMoriarty

don’t forget folks, you want to leave the union (good-bye), you are in the south, you have armed thugs and goons wandering along your border, and your largest city was underwater, and you are spelled, “Tex-Ass.”

RCB

This entire law was written for attention seeking morons. While I agree completely with gun rights for law-abiding members of the public the ONLY reason to carry a gun on your person in public is for defense of yourself or someone else.
Wearing your firearm “open carry” is a fools choice in any urban area. There is absolutely NO good reason to do it, just to try and look cool. If an active shooter, robber, etc walks into any business the first person they will shoot is the person who is openly carrying because guess what, that guy is a threat to what I am trying to accomplish.
But hey, exercise your rights all day long…including the right to be stupid

SirVesa

Yes…because it happens with such frequency in the 44 other states with legal open carry. Oh wait…no it doesn’t. In fact, quite the opposite. Stop letting your overactive imagination scare you, little girl.

RCB

Scare me from what exactly? Since you apparently have no reading comprehension skills I’ll repeat myself again: I have no problem with open-carry.

That doesn’t however, change the fact that there is absolutely no valid or tactical reason to do it in an urban environment. You want to open carry, have at it. Still makes you an idiot for doing it though

SirVesa

It makes us idiots because you disagree and because you think some bogeyman is gonna get you if you do it. Totally rational. I love you “tactical experts” almost as much as I love the people that become lawyers and doctors as soon as they connect to the Internet. You’re going to “get the jump” on a bad guy, right? Mr. Badass Gun-Ninja. You’re a tool, a fool, and a douche.

RCB

Sounds like someone is a little sensitive about the subject. This is fun so I’ll play along ….

Explain to me please WHY you first, WANT to open carry. Second, please explain why you think it’s a good idea.

Please keep the “because it’s my right” out of it. I’m conceding that point already

SirVesa

I never said I would open carry, only that there was no evidence to support that open carrying makes you a target or increases your risk. You master tacticians keep talking about the “element of surprise”…sounds like you’re just itching to have someone screw with you so you can plug ’em. And it makes perfect sense that a criminal (who are notoriously cowardly, by the way) would go after the hardest obvious target. Because it happens all the time in other states where open carry is legal…um, yeah. That’s kinda the point, Quick-Draw McGraw.

RCB

Ok, so your argument is that by open-carrying you are making yourself a less likely target for someone with criminal intent, fine. There is no data at all to support that theory, but at least its a rational argument .
Armed citizens are still frequently victims of crime. I could make the same argument for someone wanting to open carry as being “paranoid” about being a victim so they carry a gun.

I’m not going to get into a debate about tactics/training since its irrelevant except to say this.

You’ll find few, if any trained/ experienced police officers/executive protection types who would prefer open carry to concealed. It’s an ego/macho/”look at me” thing. I say this as someone who carries a gun both at work and in my free time and who is extremely comfortable with the fact that 500,000 citizens carry concealed in this state.

There are far more potential negative consequences from carrying openly vs. concealed. Again, it’s your choice to make next week but just because you have a right to do something, doesn’t make it smart

SirVesa

Also, you DO realize that the “element of surprise” is an offensive tactic, Mr. Tactical Expert. Open carry as a defensive tactic, even if it works on a fraction of criminals, is far better don’t you think? Unless, of course, you can provide this overwhelming evidence that open-carriers are being slaughtered at the beginning of every robbery in this fictional world you’ve dreamed up in your head.

SirVesa

Bottom line: you’re a tool and you keep spouting the same tired nonsense we’ve been hearing for years with no basis in fact. You don’t want to open carry, fine. You want to spread misinformation, fine. But I reserve the right to call you a clown and make fun of you for being naive, stupid, or both.

oh yes…you’re so smart. So smart you can’t do a simple Google search and see that while there are only a couple of stories of OCs being targeted, there are several CCs being attacked. Almost as if it was random…imagine that. And there are SEVERAL military and LEO that like OC. You just don’t want to see it because you don’t agree with it. You’re a condescending a$$hat butter that uses the same argument (that we’re all doing this out of ego) that the anti-gun crowd use. So no, we’re not on the same side. I support the Constitutional right of all citizens and you’re a useless wast of skin with a foul attitude. Your opinion is inconsequential, Mr. Master Tactitian.

SirVesa

“I have no problem with open carry”…except you think its stupid and that we’re all magically going to become targets when there is NO evidence in the 44 other states that it has EVER happened. Its not enough for you to just say (to yourself) “I don’t like open carry, so I’m making the choice for myself to not do so”; no, you have to share your childish unsubstantiated opinion and be a dick on the Internet and yet you still claim to be pro-2A and to be OK with OC. What a joke. Buy some Depends if seeing people open carrying guns is going to make you wet yourself, sweetheart.

redsox09

Have fun Texas and good luck!

China Cat

Ok, here’s my question: if somebody tries to grab the long arm, does he drop the baby first? Or if some imagined bad guy starts shooting and he has to go for his gun, does he drop the baby then go for his weapon? Seems like a that would be a few costly seconds. If you need to display a gun at the local grocery store are you sane enough not to use your weapon at the sound of a firecracker or are you just a jerk? These questions and more will be answered in Texas: We never said we weren’t crazy to live here in the first place,

MollyB

The baby looks properly holstered and the rifle is properly slung. No danger here. I imagine this fella is more prepared to confront an active shooter than you.

China Cat

Dear MollyB. When open carry advocates embraces people of color, or people of certain headwraps walking into public places holstered, then I will listen to you. You either believe in the right, or you don’t. In the meantime I will be prepared to stay out of the crossfire and deny any business that lets someone that has to be outwardly armed my money. You can congregate together. And I will resist the idea to live in the fear that I must have to to ‘confront’ a battle situation you seem to long for at a Kroger.

ForeverBanned

Post your proof that open carry advocates DON’T “embrace people of color, or people of certain headwraps walking into public places holstered.”

What’s that I hear? Crickets?

China Cat

Proud Patriots outside a house of worship

MollyB

awww…that’s adorable. Those ESL classes are really paying off.

Not sure where you live, but I’ve seen blacks, Hispanics, and Asians all protesting for open carry (by ‘headwraps’, I assume you mean middle eastern; yep, we’ve got those, too). Those who choose to stand for their rights are always welcome. If the problem is how certain people and law enforcement perceive those patriots of color, then maybe come help us change that perception instead of trying to turn something into a race-issue. You only show your own bigotry when you do so.

BTW…you realize that those establishments have not banned concealed carry, correct? So is it guns in general or just the sight of them that has you so perplexed? If a thin cotton t-shirt was all that was required to make you feel safe, perhaps put one over your head so you don’t have to see.

By all means, stay out of the crossfire. While you lie on the floor shrieking, awaiting a shooter to come put you out of your misery, perhaps you’ll provide a small bit of distraction so that a law-abiding citizen can put a stop to their nonsense. Hey…we’ll make sure you’ll get a medal. Posthumously, of course.

China Cat

“By all means, stay out of the crossfire. While you lie on the floor shrieking, awaiting a shooter to come put you out of your misery,” If that is your fantasy, I’m sure you will accomodate me with pleasure. Really. You are the type that I REALLY want to be carrying a loaded gun in public.

MollyB

Your preference really has no bearing here, sweetie. Its the law: deal with it. Next time you see an open carrier, by all means go tell them that you disapprove. I’m sure they could use a good chuckle.

Morgan Sheridan

Burial insurance. Invest in burial insurance.

don76550

I disagree that it will be an arduous task for police to determine if an open carry individual is a criminal or dangerous. Open carry exists in 44 other states. There has been no problem there. Are you asserting that Texas police officers are more stupid than officers in 44 other states? Have you asked a Texas officer if he is more stupid that police in other states? I suggest that experienced officers are attuned to individuals who may pose a threat. Carrying a weapon in a non threatening manner does not pose a threat. To assume so would mean game wardens should feel threatened because everyone they interact with is armed.

Larry

All the worry. 44 other states have open carry. Seems to be working out, even in Vermont.

enp1955

In Ohio, an open carry state, Tamir Rice was shot and killed within 2 seconds by a police officer because he was ‘openly carrying’ a toy gun. Two seconds. And it was deemed justified.

So what are you going to do with your two seconds when a cop sees you and your gun?

Larry

Tamir had also been walking around pointing his toy gun at people, hence the police. His toy gun did not have the bright red tip to indicate it was a toy. I don’t see the comparison since he was not a licensed carrier. To reach out for any example indicates trying to fabricate a point rather than discussing the facts and statistics. Its akin to resorting to name calling when someone disagrees.

enp1955

1. Your gun won’t have a red tip either.
2. A cop arriving on a a scene will not know if you are a licensed carrier or not.
3. The cop didn’t see him point anything at anybody.

The comparison is simple. We increasingly live in a world where living and dying is based on split second decisions and who pulls the trigger first. Who’s to say who is feeling threatened and who was justified in what action? Are we going back to the wild west with a ‘he drew first’ mentality?

Carry a weapon if you want. It is your decision and your right. But don’t be surprised if someone sees you as a threat to their safety. And good luck if that person happens to be in law enforcement.

wessexmom

I have a serious question for all you passionate open-carry fans:
Say there’s a mass shooting in a movie theater or restaurant and a number of good guys with guns open fire
on the shooter but end up killing innocent bystanders by mistake or even each other. Will they go to
jail for murder? Will they or their families get sued for every dime they have? Dead is dead; Maimed is maimed. If someone IS killed or maimed by accident who should be liable for the cost of their care, for the loss of their income? Is there insurance for such accidents? Should you be required to buy it? If not, why not?

Just as important, once police arrive on the scene, how will they be able to tell the bad guys with guns from the
good guys with guns in the split second they have to assess the situation? Seriously. What happens when good guys with guns start accidentally shooting bystanders in less hostile situations or they get shot themselves?

To the objective bystander it seems that things could quickly spiral out of control. So what happens when that happens? Please tell me.

Can someone in Texas please quickly take a photo of a black person, who looks likes a rapper/thug/gangbanger/black person, open-carrying? Please take the photo quickly, because you know the cops will take them down within seconds.

Curious as to the ratio between whites and blacks who will be randomly questioned about their guns.

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